FLINT — Michigan Republicans activists are united behind former President Donald Trump, but other strong divisions persist, a Saturday state party convention in Flint made clear.

The party selected its two candidates for the Michigan Supreme Court early Saturday evening, but voting and counting was continuing for university boards and the State Board of Education.

The former party chair, Kristina Karamo, who was ousted by party dissidents in January after less than a year in office, showed up at the Dort Financial Center and was soon escorted out of the building by security and local police. “Corruption,” Karamo said as she exited.

Former ambassador and congressman Pete Hoekstra, who was elected to replace Karamo two weeks after the vote to remove her and who has since worked to improve the party’s shaky finances, was greeted with scattered but loud boos when he took the stage to address the convention.

The convention, attended by about 4,000 delegates, alternates, and guests, elected candidates for the Michigan Supreme Court, university boards, and the State Board of Education. The convention’s work was delayed by laborious hand counting — and in some cases recounting — of ballots, and a lengthy dispute over delegate credentials that stems from rival groups claiming to be the legitimate leaders of the Kalamazoo County Republican Party. A similar party leadership dispute exists in Saginaw County, where County Clerk Vanessa Guerra, a Democrat, said recently she has recognized both groups and allowed each to name election challenges and poll watchers for the August primary.

Hoekstra, a former west Michigan congressman who served as U.S. ambassador to the Netherlands under Trump, said Saturday he’s not troubled by the ongoing discord.

“You’re always going to have an element of dissent,” Hoekstra said. “I can tell you that group’s a whole lot smaller than it was five months ago.”

Hoekstra said as long as the party is united behind Trump and former congressman Mike Rogers, who is seeking the open U.S. Senate seat in Michigan — “and they are,” he said — then, “they don’t have to like me.”

Karamo was not elected as a delegate to the convention but was granted an “all access pass” in error, Hoekstra said, before she walked onto the convention floor and was surrounded by a group of supporters. Officials offered Karamo a guest pass that would have allowed her to watch from seats surrounding the floor, but she declined, he said. That’s why she was escorted out, as was one other unidentified person, Hoekstra said.

Karamo said she was there to support a candidate and was not causing any disruption.

More: Donald Trump to visit Michigan again on Thursday. This time, it’s Potterville

The convention began making news Friday night when controversial Kalamazoo County attorney Matthew DePerno, who was defeated for state attorney general in 2022 and awaits trial on felony charges related to alleged tampering with election machines, withdrew from consideration for a Michigan Supreme Court nomination and threw his support to Branch County Circuit Judge Patrick O’Grady.

Michigan Supreme Court justices are elected on the nonpartisan portion of the ballot, but they are nominated by the two major political parties. Republican nominees would have to win both seats to reverse the 4-3 edge that Democratic nominees now hold on the court.

That is seen as a tough challenge, since the Democratic nominee, Justice Kyra Harris Bolden, will have the advantage of an incumbency designation for the partial term, and since both Democratic nominees have raised far more money for their campaigns than any of the Republican contenders.

For the full eight-year term on the state’s highest court, filling the seat being vacated by Justice David Viviano, state Rep. Andrew Fink defeated Michigan Court of Appeals Judge Mark Boonstra, despite Boonstra’s endorsement from Trump. Viviano, a Republican nominee, announced in March he would not seek another term. The Democratic nominee for the seat is attorney Kimberly Thomas.

Bolden and Thomas have raised $1.1 million and just over $826,000 respectively, and each has cash on hand that is more than five times what all the Republican nominees have raised — combined. Only Fink had reached six figures in fund-raising when pre-convention reports were filed, with just over $100,000 raised.

Fink, a Hillsdale Republican, is completing his second two-year term in the state House, where he serves as minority vice-chair of the House Judiciary Committee. The former U.S. Marine has a 2010 law degree from U-M.

After DePerno’s withdrawal, there were two contenders for a partial, four-year term on the court. There, Branch County Circuit Judge Patrick O’Grady defeated Alexandria Taylor, a Detroit attorney.

O’Grady was elected to the 15th Circuit Court in 2008 and has served there as chief judge several times. The former member of the U.S. Army Reserve has a 1999 law degree from Thomas Cooley Law School.

DePerno, who was the unsuccessful GOP candidate for attorney general in 2022, gained prominence by seizing on a clerical error in Antrim County that scrambled the county’s unofficial 2020 presidential results and using it to make false claims about manipulation of election results by Dominion Voting Systems machines. He is awaiting trial on multiple felony counts related to an alleged conspiracy to breach voting machines. DePerno has law degrees from University of Detroit Mercy School of Law and New York University School of Law.

Contact Paul Egan: 517-372-8660 or pegan@freepress.com. Follow him on X, @paulegan4.

Flint — Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will deliver a speech on the economy in Potterville Thursday, his campaign has announced.

Trump will speak at 3:30 p.m. Thursday at Alro Steel, a distributor of metals and plastics, according to the press release, which didn’t describe the event as a rally and didn’t include a link for members of the general public to register to attend.

“President Trump knows that Michiganders can’t afford another four years of leadership that frivolously spends our hard-earned money,” the press release from the Trump campaign said. “President Trump will make America affordable again and make sure that more of our money stays in our pocketbooks.”

Trump’s campaign appears to be putting Michigan in the spotlight next week. It announced the upcoming event as the Michigan Republican Party convention was taking place Saturday in Flint.

In addition to the Potterville stop, the Republican nominee will speak at a conference of the National Guard Association of the United States on Monday in Detroit, and his running mate, Ohio U.S. Sen. JD Vance will visit the Big Rapids area on Tuesday.

The Detroit and Potterville events will be Trump’s seventh and eighth stops in Michigan of the year.

Trump last visited Michigan on Tuesday, when he spoke about crime during an event that wasn’t open to the public at a Livingston County Sheriff’s Office facility in Howell.

Trump is the only Republican presidential nominee since 1988 to carry Michigan. He won the state against Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016 by less than 1 percentage point, 47.5%-47.3%, or about 10,700 votes. But four years later, in 2020, Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden by 3 percentage points, 48%-51%, in Michigan.

cmauger@detroitnews.com

CLARKSTON, MI – Bret Michaels wore three hats, err bandanas, on this night. He was the headliner, master of ceremonies and a fan.

The Poison frontman brought his “Parti Gras 2.0″ to Pine Knob on Friday, August 23. And he brought with him Eagles legendary guitarist, Don Felder, country’s Chris Janson, former Foreigner lead singer, Lou Gramm, and Twisted Sister’s, Dee Snider.

Pine Knob was actually the sight of the very first “Parti Gras” concert anywhere, taking place last summer. At that show, Michaels brought along Jefferson Starship, Night Ranger, Sugar Ray’s Mark McGrath and former lead singer of Journey, Steve Augeri. And he says he’s going to do a 3.0 in 2025.

The late arriving crowd was treated to a Rock and Roll Hall of Famer as Felder took the stage just before 7:00 p.m.

The crowd filled in quickly as he played mostly Eagles hits for 45 minutes, including “Take it Easy,” “One of These Nights” and “Hotel California.”

The variety show, of sorts, continued with Janson, who acknowledged he was the only country artist at a rock concert.

His 45 minute set included hits “Fix a Drink,” “Good Vibes” and “Buy Me a Boat.” He also did a mashup of “Great Balls of Fire” out of “Redneck Life” and a snippet of Metallica’s “Enter Sandman.”

His set was energetic and interactive. He was having fun and making sure the crowd was, too.

And that’s exactly how Bret Michaels does it. He is still a ball of energy at 61 as he took the stage just after 9:00 p.m. and kicked things off with some Poison hits with “Talk Dirty to Me” and Ride the Wind.”

“It is good to be, and for real, one of the greatest cities, one of the most unbelievable, hospitable people… Michigan, we love you.”

He then brought Felder and Janson out and the three performed “You’re Mama Don’t Dance” together.

Michaels then introduced another Rock Hall legend in Gramm, who performed three of Foreigner’s biggest hits with “Cold as Ice,” “Hot Blooded” and “Jukebox Hero.”

Michaels looked like he enjoyed watching from the side of the stage just as much as the fans did.

Next came more Poison hits with “Look What the Cat Dragged In,” “Something to Believe In” and “Unskinny Bop.”

As Michaels always does, the son of a military veteran, he brought out a number of area veterans on stage while playing “Something to Believe In,” calling them the real rock stars of the show. It’s always a touching and inspirational part of his concerts.

More rock royalty was next with Snider, who went right into “We’re Not Gonna Take it.” The crowd was so into it, he sang a part of it with the audience without any music.

Snider then performed “I Wanna Rock,” before Michaels joined him for a cover of AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell.” Snider probably received the loudest ovation of the night.

And whether he wanted to or not, Michaels asked him to come back on stage for “Nothin’ But a Good time,” which was still a couple of songs away.

Before that was, you guessed it, Poison’s biggest hit, “Every Rose Has It’s Thorn” before Michaels delivered the final song of the night.

What can you say about this concert, other than, like last year’s “Parti Gras,” it was just pure fun, a variety show where you didn’t really know what to expect next and it was exactly what the crowd paid for.